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Best Buy Customer Gets Box Full of Bathroom Tiles Instead of Hard Drive
The Consumerist is reporting that a Best Buy customer recently purchased a hard drive only to discover that the box contained six ceramic bathroom tiles instead of the Western Digital drive he had expected. The rub of it is Best Buy is refusing to grant a refund or exchange for the non-existent drive. "The employee and assistant manager were more than willing to help, saying that it happens. So they set up the return and I repurchased the drive and while I was checking the contents to ensure it was a hard drive this time, the store manager came up, took the box from me and said to take it up with the manufacturer. Now to my surprise, I argued with the guy saying that they have already accepted the return and I have now purchased the new one. He said I was shit out of luck. I followed up with the manufacturer today and they said they would get the complaint to the Best Buy Purchasing department. Best Buy corporate said that they stand by their manager's decision."
This reminds me so much of the story of someone I know who back in the mid-90s had a shrink wrapping machine. He bought a CD-ROM drive from some department store, took it home, took the CD-ROM drive out. Then he took a brick and placed it back in the CD-ROM box, srinkwrapped the box and then returned it to the store like it was unopened.
Now can you imagine what the next person who bought that had to go through?
So thisb fhf could just be a case of someone trying to trick Best Buy and trying to use a grass roots campaign scam Best Buy.
If you purchased with a credit card, can't you issue a chargeback?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chargeback
Granted it is only wikipedia, but it does list 'failure to issue a refund' as a reason for a chargeback.
Out of modpoints but really liked a post? 1BDkF6TtmmeZ3yqXbz9yhdYVqRYnwFoXDj
If I buy something and it doesn't work, I take it back to the store and they replace it or repair it. They can then take it up with the manufacturer, or not: I don't care. Repair is a high-stakes game, because if trading standards believe that they're doing it to delay, or that the failure was unreasonable, they vendor has a problem. SoGA protection is a movable feast, but applies for at least a year.
I was a customer service manager for a Best Buy in Houston, TX for a little over a year. Best Buy Store #291 - "The PowerHouse" Galleria. This store did incredible revenue. My specialty was dealing with overtly horrible Best Buy politics on a daily basis. I sat in on numerous Geek Squad and Home Installation meetings where Management would tell the service sales people to increase their service revenue "by any means necessary." I kid you not, I saw employees express concern about the prices and methods of invoking cash from vulnerable customers, and the management would repeat itself by saying, "by any means necessary." I saw an employee charge a customer $59 to "diagnose" her computer when a CD was stuck in her CD-rom drive, when all he did was pop it out with a paper clip. I saw more horrible Best Buy policies than you could imagine, and I made a good living for a year of my life, trying to negotiate comprimises between customers who had been ripped off bluntly, and Best Buy's corporate ladder, to try and salvage any sliver of dignity that company could possibly salvage, and this speciality of mine only lasted until I'd expressed my concern to the corporate level enough that they realized it would be easier to push me out of their store than it would be to address the concerns that I brought to their attention with regard to their return, exchange, and serviec policies. Being on the inside of that place blew my mind. As for their "service plans," they use the rock-bottom dollar lowest-bidder service centers that broke as many things as they repaired, if not more. Seeing this bit on /. reminded me of the days I spent with customers who were literally crying infront of me because of how this company had wronged them. I'm not saying don't shop there - frankly I could care less and I still buy the occasional item from Best Buy out of sheer convenience, but stories like this one never surprise me, in the sense that Best Buy's business model is to make money by any means necessary.
What you are missing is that the store did in fact refund the persons money. The person then purchased a new hard drive. The store manager proceeded to commit a robbery by seizing the persons property without their permission. The property that was siezed was a hard drive. The transaction concerning the tiles was over and done with in a legal fashion.
;) ) and when I called you on it, you told me that sometimes this mistake happens, and delivered the Tower Bridge, there would be no breach of contract. Of course, if after the transaction is over, and the correct bridge has been delivered, you turned around and seize the Tower bridge from me, and told me to take it up with your corporate headquarters, you would not be in breach of contract. It would be a simple robbery. OK, not simple. It is a bridge after all, but it would still be robbery.
To use your analogy, if you showed me a picture of Tower Bridge, and delivered the London Bridge, (Yes, even though I am an America, I do understand the difference.
The issue here isn't that the store refused the return. The took the return. The real issue is that after the guy bought a real (presumably) function hard drive, the manager of the store approached the customer, and seized his property. That is robbery.